page_title: Chinook wind
section_title: Chinook arch
hierarchical_section_title: Chinook wind / Chinook arch
caption_attribution_description: Chinook arch in southern Alberta, Canada, east of Claresholm
context_page_description: Chinook winds, or simply Chinooks, are föhn winds in the interior West of North America, where the Canadian Prairies and Great Plains meet various mountain ranges, although the original usage is in reference to wet, warm coastal winds in the Pacific Northwest.
  The Blackfoot people term this wind "Snow Eater"; however, the more commonly used term "Chinook" originates from the language spoken by the eponymous people in the region where the usage was first derived. The reference to a wind or weather system, simply "a Chinook", originally meant a warming wind from the ocean into the interior regions of the Pacific Northwest of the US.
  A strong föhn wind can make snow one foot deep almost vanish in one day. The snow partly melts and partly sublimates in the dry wind. Chinook winds have been observed to raise winter temperature, often from below −20 °C to as high as 10–20 °C for a few hours or days, then temperatures plummet to their base levels. The greatest recorded temperature change in 24 hours was caused by Chinook winds on 15 January 1972, in Loma, Montana; the temperature rose from −48 to 9 °C.
context_section_description: One of its most striking features is the Chinook arch, a föhn cloud in the form of a band of stationary stratus clouds caused by air rippling over the mountains due to orographic lifting. To those unfamiliar with it, the Chinook arch may look like a threatening storm cloud at times. However, they rarely produce rain or snow. They can also create stunning sunrises and sunsets.
  The stunning colours seen in the Chinook arch are quite common. Typically, the colours will change throughout the day, starting with yellow, orange, red and pink shades in the morning as the sun comes up, grey shades at midday changing to pink / red colours, and then orange / yellow hues just before the sun sets.
caption: Chinook arch in southern Alberta
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